BBB Dispute Ends in Huge Waste of Time

When we left off in Part Four we were still embroiled in a dispute being handled through the Better Business Bureau, or BBB. What we didn’t understand at the time was that businesses pay to be members of BBB. As a paying member of the northern Indiana BBB, it should come as no surprise that the complaint was closed in favor of Forest River.

One of the last emails Henry Sears sent to the BBB dispute was this email. Remember it, because you will see it again.

A Message From Super Springs International

When it became apparent that we weren’t getting anywhere with Forest River, Lippert or the BBB, we reached out to Super Springs International – the makers of Sumo Springs – for their input on our situation. It took a while (and a strongly worded email) to get a response back, but we did get one, and it confirms what we already suspected.

Mr. Coulter is Director of Sales for Super Springs International. As you can see, Super Springs does not approve of Forest River’s libelous allegations. This is also not surprising. But it is very refreshing to deal with a company who stands behind the design, construction, quality and benefit of their products.

But back to Forest River and Lippert

Lippert Remains Silent

You may recall the email that we sent to Lippert on May 3.

Since it had been 72 days, we decided to send another, based on the new information.

We will update you all in the event that Lippert responds.

UPDATE: Within two hours this post’s publication Lippert responded to the above email. They have requested more information, and are requesting our location so that they can dispatch technicians to do their own inspection. We will update you on this situation as it progresses.

Seeking Help from the Attorney General

After BBB proved to be a huge waste of time we also initiated a complaint with our Attorney General’s office. We provided links to parts one, two, three and four of our Forest River Fails saga for the AG to review. After a while we received this response from Forest River, via the AG’s office.

Remember the email that Henry Sears sent to the BBB complaint? This is the same email, verbatim. Mr. Sears still isn’t paying attention.

Attached to this response was a statement from the AG’s office that if we wanted to dispute any of Forest River’s comments that we had 30 days to do so before the case would be closed. Needless to say, we dispute Forest River’s comments, but we are withholding our response back to the Attorney General until we see what happens next.

Until Next Time

If you are considering getting into the RV life, you really need to understand just how bad the industry is; both in building the RVs in the first place, as well as how they handle customer service after the fact.

Don’t allow yourself to be treated this way. You spent too much money on your RV to have the people that built it tell you that it’s your fault that it broke.

Can you imagine if automobile manufacturers did this? How many trucks would Ford sell if the cab began to fall off the frame at 36,000 miles? That’s right, not many, and the NHTSA would be knocking down their door. Why are RV manufacturers not held responsible for building their junk?

Until next time!

The post Forest River Fails, Denies Responsibility – Part Five appeared first on Metaphysical Family.

The Defects Continue

We had noticed a bulge in the rear most portion of the passenger sidewall behind the slide. The bulge is (was) in the black aluminum skirting at the bottom of the wall which hides the wall seam and the frame rail. We don’t remember exactly when the bulge first appeared, but it was not there in February of 2022 when I was busy making skirts for the RV.

The bulge _was_ present in the fall of 2022, as can be seen in this picture from October.

The bulge had grown by February, but was still only a bulge at that time.

This is what the bulge looks like today. The video explains the rest.

As you can see, the first screw which backed out was one of the screws securing the bottom of the wall structure to the RV’s floor assembly. The RV’s floor assembly is then (supposed to be) bolted to the frame with the fasteners discussed in Part One and Part Two. Now the rest of this same line of screws which hold the sidewall to the floor assembly have begun to back out.

Will the RV make it back to our property? We honestly don’t know at this point, but we obviously hope so. Forest River still denies any responsibility for this damage or repair.

Forest River Fails, Denies Responsibility (Again)

If you recall the email that we sent back to Forest River after their denial, that email politely suggested that they review our case and reconsider. We thought that after we explained the situation with the frame checks having been done incorrectly that Forest River would tell us to find another shop to have the work redone.

But that’s not what happened.

We didn’t get any further responses from Forest River until I called LCI directly. After we had done so we sent the following email to Forest River.

Forest River did respond by EOD 4/7. This is what they sent.

Climbing the Ladder

Cheyenne Clark is the public interface to Forest River service. Since she is the only public point of contact for the service department, anyone wishing to communicate with Forest River must go through her. At least, that’s how Forest River would prefer it to be. But the power of the internet can help a person find all kinds of useful information.

Did you know that there are websites that keep track of companies’ boards of directors, C-level executives, etc? They sometimes include contact information for those company executives. Many of the people in this story are on LinkedIn as well.

We sent the following email as our final direct email communication about our case to Forest River. We sent it to Cheyenne Clark, whom you already know. We also sent it to two other people: Peter Liegl – Forest River’s founder and CEO, and David Youmans, Forest River’s C-level “Director of Ethics and Compliance”.

We were hopeful that this email to high level executives would get our case the attention it deserved.

Our hopes were shattered when we received this email from Henry Sears, who we presume is somewhere in middle management; above Cheyenne Clark and Chad Cook, but below the C-levels that we emailed above. Was Mr. Sears willing to help, or even discuss our case further?

No, he only doubled down again.

Lippert is Silent

Forest River keeps telling us to discuss the case with Lippert. it would be great if we could do that. Unfortunately, Lippert has been very elusive when we ask them for their denial and the reasons for it in writing. The last email we sent to Lippert was this one. We are still waiting for an answer…

And remember – ALL OF THIS centers around this supposed frame issue which neither Forest River nor LCI want to talk about, and which RV Masters has proven does not exist.

Refund or Replace

What a complete and total mess. Am I right?

When all this started we would have been very happy to have the crack repaired so that we could continue our traveling adventure. After everything that has happened, it seems that wasn’t meant to be. People say things like “The Lord moves in mysterious ways …”. As I have said before, that has not been my experience. I find it to be downright overt at times.

With the continued problems we are having with this RV we do not feel that it can be repaired. We have resigned ourselves to moving out of the RV and changing directions. Now we are hoping that the RV stays together long enough for us to get to our property. Once there it can sit stationary until we get the house built, but it can not continue to be used for travel camping in its condition.

With damage this severe we are seeking either a replacement unit or a refund. Even if this one can be saved we would never be able to trust it. How could we? Just take Forest River’s word for it because we have experienced so much honesty to this point?

To Be Continued

Thank you again to everyone who has come forward with their similar stories and support. There is a cynicism that we see both inside and outside the RV community too often. “It’s an RV. You should have known it was built as cheaply as they can make one. They have problems. That’s just part of it.”

I am not sorry that I refuse to accept this failure as normal, or just part of owning an RV. This is not normal wear and tear. The body of an RV should not fall off in the first year. That’s not a normal thing that happens. Our unit is bad, and Forest River should feel bad. But they don’t.

We have strength in numbers. The more of us there are, the more reasonable it becomes to hear terms like “class action” being thrown around. If you own a Forest River RV and have a similar experience, do not accept this as normal. If this is normal for Forest River, Forest River needs a new normal in a bad way.

Check back for the next – and hopefully final – episode of Forest River Fails, Denies Responsibility. We are living the next episode as we type this one. We will update you all as soon as we have more to share.

Update: Part four is now available.

The post Forest River Fails, Denies Responsibility – Part Three appeared first on Metaphysical Family.

At the conclusion of Forest River Fails, Denies Responsibility – Part One we knew these things:

• Our RV does not have a frame issue, despite Forest River’s insistence to the contrary.
• Our RV was built using fasteners which either:
  • Weren’t tightened appropriately at the factory, or
  • Were tightened at the factory, but backed off from the tight position because they were not the proper fastener for this connection.
• Forest River claims that they have no responsibility. They claim this based on statements apparently made by LCI (Lippert) centering around the Sumo Springs we added to the RV.

But as you read in episode one, there is no issue with our frame, and there never was. But we are not alone in this failure.

There are Others

After we received the denial email from Cheyenne Clark, we sent our response to Forest River.

^{[Update: The SuperSprings link above is no longer valid. Anyone wishing to view that page should view the internet archive version located here. Thanks Wes! The FTC link is valid and located here. ]}

We mention another RV that we know Forest River had repaired. That RV belonged to a very kind gentleman named Kevin that we met through Facebook. Kevin’s 2019 model 36BHQ had failed in almost exactly the same way that ours had.

I spent a while talking with Kevin about his issue. Kevin let me know that it took a very long time to get it resolved. Kevin had to involve his State’s Attorney General’s office, the Better Business Bureau and the process still took _two years_ to be resolved. Forest River had fixed his issue under “good faith” in 2022, over _two years_ after Kevin’s “warranty” expired.

Since this whole mess began we have met several more people online who have this exact issue with their Forest River RV’s as well. Most of those have either not begun a warranty/”good faith” repair claim, or have just begun the process.

Forest River is obviously aware that this is a recurring problem with these units. I hope that we are not the first to link the loose body bolts with the sidewall failures for them. If we are, we also have a simple solution for the problem.

Use of Incorrect Fastener

Forest River uses serrated flange nuts to fasten the body bolts to the frame. Anyone with even a little mechanical experience (or a Forest River RV) knows that this is not the correct fastener for this job. Perhaps the nuts were spun up finger tight on the studs by the worker who drilled the holes in the floor, and then left for the next guy. Perhaps the timer on our unit ran out before those fasteners could be tightened. We can only speculate as to whether the fasteners were tightened properly at the factory.

But let’s assume that the flange nuts were tightened at the factory. If any of that structure compresses (which it really shouldn’t) during shakedown there is nothing to prevent the flange nut from vibrating and shaking itself more loose. If only there were a fastener that could be used which would stay in place once it’s tightened, even if the things it’s holding get compressed. There is! The correct fastener would be the nylon lock nut.

There are 24 of these bolts exposed on the 36BHQ. When purchased at Fastenal by an individual the price difference is a mere $5.80. Forest River undoubtedly has the purchasing power to get that down even lower. Or they could build that into the sale price of each unit. I am sure the retail customer that ends up with the unit would happily pay the $6 to know that the body won’t fall off their RV. We certainly would have.

[Update: The SuperSprings link above is no longer valid. Anyone wishing to view that page should view the web archive page here.]

If you own a Forest River RV, it’s worth checking these body studs. We have met several people online since posting part one of this story who have checked their body studs to find the bolts loose as well.

Join “Sabre RV Camper by Forest River” on Facebook to follow this thread.

* ^{Join “Sabre RV Camper by Forest River” and “Sabre 36BHQ Owners Group” on Facebook to follow these conversations.}

Stay Tuned!

Despite the overwhelming evidence, Forest River has maintained that they have no responsibility for this failure. We maintain that they do. How will it all shake out?

Don’t miss the next installment in episode three of Forest River Fails, Denies Responsibility!

_{This post may contain affiliate links from which we may earn a small commission at no additional expense to you. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.}

The post Forest River Fails, Denies Responsibility – Part Two appeared first on Metaphysical Family.

Bubbles in the Wallpaper

We don’t recall exactly when Brittany noticed that the wallpaper on the rear wall had began to bubble, but we knew that it most likely meant a water leak. The bubbles were appearing at the outer edge of the rear wall on both sides of the large window in the area between the Edison style lights on the wall and where the outlets are located.

We became concerned because pictures of this type of bubbling we had seen on the internet. The owners of the RVs in the photos almost always found mold under the wall paneling. We knew that we had to get into the wall to assess the damage.

Teardown

Removing Cabinetry

We began by removing our shelf/desk unit and the factory installed side tables. These side tables were installed next to the jack-knife couch that we removed to install our workstations. We kept the side tables and cabinets because they were there and they offered storage space. They weren’t holding up well at all though. The cabinet on the service side had recently broken under the load of the items stored in the cabinet. Thankfully the shore power cord hidden inside the cabinet was not damaged.

Next we removed the upper cabinet unit. Most of the screws holding the upper cabinet in place are visible within the cabinet. They are the square drive screws which are screwed into the walls and ceiling. But there are more screws hidden in the floor of the cabinet which hold the bottom of the cabinet to the wall. To access these we carefully removed the bottom paneling of the upper cabinet unit to gain access to the screws.

The upper cabinet is exactly as wide as the inside of the RV. This makes removing the cabinet tricky. We carefully lowered the cabinet and moved it into the long vertical side windows. This allows just enough space to tilt and turn the cabinet and remove it from the work area. (We don’t have pictures of this because it took both of us to handle the cabinet.)

All that was left at this point was to remove the various bits of corner trim. remove the trim strips and the wall paneling. Be careful when handling the trim strips. The ends of the staples are SHARP!

Removing Wallboard

The wallboard is attached with the same narrow crown staples used to attach everything else. We began removing it by slicing the tape covering the joint in the middle of the wall. Then we pried at the seam until the staples either pulled loose or pulled through the wallboard. Note that we never intended to reuse the wallboard, based on the mold assumption.

The wallboard pulls away easily at the top and where they meet in the middle (watch out for staples!). At the bottom the wallboard extends below the floor, and the wallboard is sandwiched between the rear and side walls of the RV at the outside edges. There did not seem to be a way to remove this material without removing the entire rear wall from the RV. We opted to use an undercut saw instead, and carefully slit the wallboard along the floor and outside walls.

By removing most of the screws in three sides of the window frame we were able to leave the window in place in the wall. The removed and loosened screws allowed us to pull the frame back enough to pull the wall board out from behind the window frame.

Inspecting and Repairing RV Water Intrusion

After the wallboard was removed it was easy to see where the water had been coming in, and where it had been running to. We were relieved to find no visible mold on any of the wood! While there were wet areas along both outside seams, we were grateful that we had gotten to the problem before mold had set in. We sprayed the whole area down with vinegar to kill any mold we couldn’t see.

We dried the area with fans and ran a dehumidifier during that time as well. We did not have a moisture meter, but we waited 24 hours after the wall was dry to touch and sight to apply the paint. We used a spray paint because we didn’t want to re-dampen the wall any more than necessary.

After the paint was dry it was time to start putting everything back together. But before that could happen we had to pull what felt like a thousand staples out of the wall. Don’t forget the staples under the window frame.

Replacement Wallboard

We used 4×8 sheets of 1/5 inch hardwood plywood underlayment from Home Depot to replace the factory installed wallboard. It is the same thickness as the factory installed material, but seems to be much stronger material. The new sheeting resisted breaking much more than the factory panel.

We used the old wall panels as templates to cut out the new panels. Since we weren’t going to wallpaper this wall, we determined which side of the panel we wanted to be visible, then placed the old panel on top of it. Using a marker we traced around the old panel’s outline and openings, then cut out the shape using a our trusty Ryobi jigsaw.

After the pieces were cut out we used our narrow crown stapler and 1″ staples to attach the new panel to the wall. Since the new panel doesn’t extend out to the last member of the wall we put extra staples in the 2×6 blocks on either side.

Staining the Panels

After the pieces were installed the family helped get the panels stained. We used BAER water based stain and poly. We would normally stain outside, but there was a chance of rain in the forecast. It didn’t rain, but we didn’t want to take the chance of having to scrap a panel.

Results

We think it turned out pretty well.

But what about the leak?

We were worried that the leak was coming from the roof, but after seeing where the water was we were able to identify the actual point of entry. The rearmost vertical corner trim on the outside of the RV was not sealed well. I had assumed that these were sealed with what I had though was an epoxy. I thought that what I was seeing on the seam was the epoxy having squished out from behind the trim. I was obviously mistaken.

What I was seeing was not squished out epoxy. What I was seeing was what Forest River considered “good enough” to seal this seam. Whatever sealant was used is not silicone, nor is it non-sag dicor. It behaves more like the hot glue we found sealing the front cap lights in the RV. Whatever it is, it is not good at its job, and there wasn’t enough of it applied in the first place.

We resealed this seam on both sides with GE Advanced silicone. We used a lot, because we do not want to do this again.

Products featured in this post

_{This post may contain affiliate links from which we may earn a small commission at no additional expense to you. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.}

Product Image	Product Description
	Zinsser 287512 Molding Blocking Spray Primer, 13 oz, White
	Ryobi ZRP360 ONE Plus 18V Cordless Lithium-Ion 1-1/2 in. Narrow Crown Stapler (Bare Tool) (Renewed)
	Ryobi P343 18V One+ Cordless Oscillating Multi-Tool (Bare tool)
	DEWALT DNS18100-2 0.75″ Narrow Crown Staple
	GE Advanced Silicone Window & Door Sealant Black, 10.1 oz, 1, Cartridge

The post Repairing RV Water Intrusion appeared first on Metaphysical Family.